Why Kentucky football is likely to pursue a transfer QB while building around Cutter Boley
Despite Cutter Boley struggling in Kentucky football’s season-ending loss to Louisville, Mark Stoops and offensive coordinator Bush Hamdan left no doubt after the game their plan was to build around the much-hyped freshman quarterback moving forward.
But it appears UK will be a player in the transfer portal quarterback market again this offseason anyway.
“I think we have to go get one,” UK coach Mark Stoops said of a transfer quarterback during his news conference Wednesday announcing the 2025 high school signing class. “Just to have some stability in there.”
Kentucky signed high school quarterbacks Stone Saunders and Brennen Ward Wednesday. Both are rated as three-star prospects by the 247Sports Composite and set to enroll at UK in January.
While Stoops and recruiting coordinator Vince Marrow heaped praise on the long-term potential of both quarterback signees, Stoops also acknowledged he could not rely on freshmen as the primary depth options next season. That could be the case if Brock Vandagriff and Gavin Wimsatt elect to use their final seasons of eligibility elsewhere after Boley was named the starter for the finale.
Vandagriff is almost certainly done playing at Kentucky — and might be done playing football all together. After starting the first 11 games of the season, the former Georgia transfer was in uniform for the Louisville game but did not play after Boley was sidelined by a helmet-to-helmet hit. Stoops later confirmed Vandagriff was healthy for the game.
Wimsatt provided his best performance of the season in relief of Boley against Louisville, but the former Rutgers transfer is limited as a passer. Kentucky would surely welcome him back for depth, but he did little in 2024 to prove he was capable of starting for a winning team in the SEC. If he wants to start in his final season of eligibility, he might be best served to look elsewhere.
That scenario would leave Saunders and Ward as the only backups for Boley without a transfer addition.
“I haven’t seen them yet, not at all,” Stoops said. “We’ve watched them throw and believe in them or we wouldn’t sign them, but I think we all know you need to have at least two or three quality quarterbacks to be on your roster.”
Finding a transfer quarterback who is willing to sign with Kentucky without the guarantee of a starting job might be difficult. Most quarterbacks in the portal are players who were blocked from the field at their previous school and are looking for a clearer path to playing time or have already excelled as starters at smaller programs and are looking to prove themselves against more difficult competition.
The presence of Boley on the roster makes Kentucky a difficult fit for quarterbacks in either of those groups, but coaches can at least sell a legitimate chance to compete for the starting job. While UK’s staff has made it clear they view Boley as the quarterback of the future, Kentucky did not score on any of his 15 drives against Power Four competition.
The original plan was for Vandagriff to start for two seasons before Boley took over the job in 2026. Boley’s strong performance off the bench against Murray State and Texas suggested he was ahead of schedule, but Kentucky at least needs a competent insurance plan if he is not ready to be the starter next season.
Of the two freshmen, Saunders looks like the more likely option to be an early contributor.
He already holds the Pennsylvania high school record with 202 career touchdown passes and will probably break the record for career passing yards and career completions while playing for a state championship on Friday. The son of a former NFL strength and conditioning coach, Saunders was first recruited to UK by now Tampa Bay Buccaneers offensive coordinator Liam Coen but elected to stay in the class when Bush Hamdan replaced Coen last spring.
When Saunders committed to Kentucky, the 247Sports Composite ranked him as the No. 20 quarterback in the class. That recruiting rating dipped over the course of his last two high school seasons though, and he signed with UK as the No. 43 quarterback in the class by the same metric.
“He’s just got so much good film out there,” Stoops said. “Just a ball player, and so he’s just a guy that it just doesn’t take long to put on the film and like the way he plays ball. Obviously throwing for that many yards and touchdowns you see he can distribute the football.”
Marrow has recruited Ward through two offensive coordinator changes at Kentucky. He committed to the Wildcats in March, becoming the first quarterback to pick UK after Hamdan was hired.
At 6-foot-3, 205 pounds, Ward has the hoped-for size of an SEC quarterback, but his Ohio high school program was not nearly as successful as Saunders’ Pennsylvania team.
“He reminds me of Dak Prescott, a little bit,” Marrow said of Ward. “He’s a very smart kid. He’s a coach’s son. ... So I think we got two really good young arms, young guys. You got to have them. And when it comes in these guys have an opportunity because both of them are coming in January so they go through spring ball. And I think it’s going to be good for both.”
Keeping quarterbacks on campus for multiple years in backup roles is difficult for any program in the transfer portal era, but Kentucky has been hit particularly hard by turnover at the position. Last winter, Stoops had to replace his entire quarterback room after losing starter Devin Leary to the NFL and backups Kaiya Sheron, Destin Wade and Deuce Hogan to the transfer portal.
Keeping Boley will be among the most important tasks for the staff this offseason as it looks to rebuild the roster around him, but even assuming Boley returns there is a real scenario where he is the only 2024 UK quarterback on the roster next season.
That means for the third offseason in a row and fourth time in five years, Kentucky is in the market for a transfer quarterback. The first priority in the portal is to find three starter-quality offensive linemen to protect Boley or whoever plays quarterback next season, but the highest profile position must be addressed too.
“My concentration has been the quality, the really good people, really good players in our program,” Stoops said. “We know we need to build that foundation with them and then branch out from there.”